NEW ORLEANS (AP) -- A federal judge has overturned a man's death sentence and conviction in a 1993 murder during an armed robbery of a Natchitoches Parish nightclub.

U.S. District Judge Dee D. Drell of Alexandria granted 56-year-old Willard Allen's petition seeking to overturn his conviction, ruling last week that the state trial court allowed an "avowedly biased juror to be seated on petitioner's jury, through a fatally defective voir dire."

Drell returned the case to state court with instructions to conduct a bail hearing within 45 days of Thursday's judgment.

Allen, of Natchitoches, remains in custody at the Louisiana State Penitentiary at Angola. The state has 270 days to decide whether to retry him. Drell says if that doesn't happen the state must release him.

An eight day capital murder trial ends Saturday afternoon. There was crying and hugging in the courtroom as Brian Horn was sentenced to death for killing Justin Bloxom, 12, in March of 2010.

When Brian Horn left the courtroom around 4:30 p.m., he had nothing to say about his death sentence. It took the jury only an hour and a half to come to this decision. Prosecutors believe this finally brings closure to Bloxom's family.

" I believe the death sentence was appropriate for this offender," said Ron Stamps, Assistant District Attorney for Desoto Parish. "Mr. Horn is a predator who manipulated and a deceived a child and then killed him. The death sentence was warranted in this case."

Stamps went on to say that in all of the cases he's handled in his career, no one deserved the death penalty more than Brian Horn. Stamps and Dhu Thompson delivered the closing arguments for the prosecution.

Defense attorney Daryl Gold disagreed with the death sentence, and estimates Horn will be on death row for more than 20 years.

"They're never going to get closure. They don't realize. If he would've received a life sentence, the family would've had closure tomorrow. I don't think Brian Horn will ever be executed and I think the death penalty will eventually be abolished," said Daryl Gold, as he walked out the courtroom.

Before the trial, Gold had offered the prosecution a plea deal for Brian Horn to serve life in prison. Prosecutors turned it down after consulting with Justin Bloxom's family.

Brian Horn's ex-wife Amanda Horn was also in the courtroom when the jury gave Horn the death sentence. She let out a loud yelp.

"There's more than one victim in this case," said Amanda Horn "It's been a hard road for all of us. Just glad that it's over. I do believe the right thing was done and I believe justice has been served. "

During the trial, defense attorneys alleged Brian Horn never meant to kill Justin Bloxoom when he pretended to be a teenage girl and lured him into his taxi promising sex via text messages. Instead, attorneys allege Horn meant to use Bloxom to have sex with his wife Amanda and his girlfriend.

Also during the final day of trial, Brian Horn's mother testified for two hours for the defense. She talked about Horn's troubled childhood, beginning at nine months old.

BATON ROUGE - Condemned serial killer Derrick Todd Lee has failed to convince a state judge that he deserves a new trial over the slaying of former LSU graduate student Charlotte Murray Pace in 2002.

Lee's case now goes to the Louisiana Supreme Court. If justices there also reject Lee's arguments, the case would move to the federal post-conviction relief stage.

State District Judge Richard Anderson on Tuesday denied the 45-year-old St. Francisville man's state court petition for post-conviction relief. Anderson rejected, among other things, Lee's claims of ineffective assistance of counsel at the guilt and penalty phases of his trial in Baton Rouge.

Lee was found guilty in 2004 of first-degree murder in the slaying of 22-year-old Pace on May 31, 2002, and was sentenced to death.

A Louisiana serial killer linked to the gruesome murders of seven women died Thursday as he awaited execution, officials said.

Derrick Todd Lee's cause of death was not immediately released. The 47-year-old was moved from the Louisiana State Penitentiary's death row to a hospital Saturday for unknown medical reasons.

An autopsy will be performed by the West Feliciana coroner's office, Pam Laborde, a spokeswoman for the Department of Public Safety and Corrections, told the Advocate.

Lee -- who was connected to seven murders between 1998 and 2003 in the Baton Rouge and Lafayette -- appealed his death sentence earlier this year. The Louisiana Supreme Court rejected his bid in September, putting him one step closer to execution.

A date had not been set for the execution.

Lee was sentenced to death in 2004 for killing and mutilating LSU graduate student Charlotte Murray Pace in her Baton Rouge home in 2002. The 22-year-old was raped, bludgeoned and stabbed more than 80 times, officials said.

He received a separate life sentence for the 2002 killing of 21-year-old Geralyn Barr DeSoto, of Addis.

"I've been prosecuting for over 40 years in the state of Louisiana, and some of the most horrible things I've ever viewed ... were committed by Derrick Todd Lee," said attorney John Sinquefield, who handled the death penalty phase in the Pace case.

Authorities suspect Lee killed five other women -- Trineisha Dené Colomb, Randi Mebruer, Pam Kinamore, Carrie Lynn Yoder and Gina Wilson Green -- between 1998 and 2003, but he was never tried in those cases.

More worm food. Doesn't matter how - just that he is gone and can't hurt anyone else or breath our air, eat our food and take up space.

Dee

The problem with socialism is that you eventually run out of other people's money - Margaret ThatcherThe most terrifying words in the English language: "I'm from the government and I'm here to help." - Ronald Reagan